The playoff scramble … elsewhere

Nashville moved into fourth in the Western Conference, and San Jose beat Dallas to hang onto eighth.

The Canadiens were idle … but there was news.

Peter Budaj’s back-up against Tampa Bay at the Bell Centre Wednesday night will be Robert Mayer, who was recalled from Hamilton with forward Gabriel Dumont.

And Pierre LeBrun of ESPN reported the Canadiens’ search for a new general manager has reached out to super agent Pat Brisson (clients include Sidney Crosby, Jonathan Toews and Evgeni Malkin) and Chicago assistant GM Marc Bergevin.

The Canadiens also have asked Toronto for permission to interview Leafs assistant GM Claude Loiselle.

262 Comments

as far as the shootout deliberation is concerned and the 1 point for a team that loses why not just have 5 mins of overtime. Then if that doesn’t settle it, each team gets a 5 on 4 power play till someone scores, winner gets the 2 points loser 0 and thats that

The Milbury article raises an interesting point:
The Wild West is no longer so wild anymore. It used to be that there were tons of brawls out west, and they would sneer at the ‘fancy’ game of the east.

Now, it’s the Beasts of the East and the Mild West, as teams like Vancouver and Detroit dominate with their finesse play, while Philly and Boston bash skulls in the East.

It seems like the “new” NHL is whatever team is having success. After the lock out, speedy teams like Buffalo made Chara look so bad in the playoffs that Ottawa decided to sign Redden instead of Chara. ( I bet they would like a do-over!!!). Everyone said Montreal was too small after the 2010 rebuild on-the-fly, until they went to the ECF. The size debate was over…until Montreal started losing and Boston wins the Cup with truculence. Now size and truculence is important again, just like Brian Burke said… except Toronto now has a small, speedy team built for the “new” NHL.

The best team in the league is the Blues who are all huge monsters, proving that size and toughness matter, until the Canucks passed them in the standings with a speedy, finesse team with no toughness at all. Confused yet? Me too.

Yeah, for sure.
Which is why I don’t agree with everyone pillorying Gainey. He built a team for the ‘New NHL’, which was going to be dominated by speed and skill.
They did well until the thugs, who had neither of those things, took over, and the NHL turned a blind eye.
Gainey shouldn’t be blamed for building a team for what the NHL purported to be, the NHL should be blamed for not sticking to their promise.

For correction’s sake: Florida lost to Winnipeg last night, not Washington. The Capitals had the night off last night after losing to Tampa the other night, allowing Buffalo to catch them again with their own win vs Toronto.

Lapierre demanded a trade because he wasn’t happy with his ice-time, which was pure bullshit. At the time his average ice-time was among the tops in the league for 4th liners, which is exactly what he is. In other words, he didn’t want to play here anymore. He was even given an opportunity to play on the top 6 as a winger on more than one occasion.

But of course now he scores 10 goals a year on one of the best teams in the league and he’s just another one of those players Montreal apparently tossed away.

JM decided he hated Lapierre, Latendresse, and SK74 before they even showed up for their first training camp.

They all left for nothing and are doing well elsewhere (except for Gui’s unfortunate injury).

We have a roster where half the forwards are AHLers, and have given away as many players for nothing (add Dagostini, Moore, Halpern, etc … to that list). I think this more than anything else is why JM was fired.

For sure.
Concussions are no fun for no-one.
I’ll leave laughing at them to Mike Milbury.
I just think his out-of-shapeness gave a pretty good indication of his overall attitude, and nicely supported our canning of his butt.

…for Brisson to be interested, and accept the GM position would blow My mind …WHY ??? In the World would He walk-away from His lucrative agency and California lifestyle for the uncertainty of a GM position in the Montreal hockey circus ?
…if he is crazy enough to decide to do so, it must mean he truly has been an unrequited Fan of Our Habs
…BUT …

If you add up all the goals scored by ex hab forwards this year on other teams it would be an impressive total….now many of these players did not perform here or were seen as not a good fit..now that decision by management is fine if they can bring in capable replacements…gauthier and his staff failed badly on this…

On Gagnon’s article:
Check out the bars in Montreal. You know the ones with the CH painted on their windows and the banks upon banks of cheap flat-screen tvs?

The bars that used to be cool places to hang out and have a drink and chat, but decided to install tvs so that they could cash in on CHmania… and then leave the tvs on all the time, regardless of whether there is anything on, thus killing the ambiance of the place?

Yeah, the ones with all the empty chairs, and the owners wondering how they’re going to pay for said tvs.

Whence the Habs go, so too go these bars that sold out their natural atmosphere for hockey fans. I hope they learn something from it.

Another slow day around here, uh?
Nothing much to say, and discussing GM’s gets boring quickly, to me anyways.
Not excited about Dumont, and Mayer should normally not get a sniff of ice time.
I’ll watch the game, but as it’s been the case latetly, might tune out after a while.

I have to say that I like the list of candidates. For those crying about the language issue, please submit a list of unilingual anglophone candidates that could be available that are OBVIOUSLY better choices than Julien Brisebois, Pat Brisson, Marc Bergevin and Claude Loiselle.

The more I think about it, the more intriguing Pat Brisson is as a candidate, and not only for the fantasy of seeing him bring in Crosby as a UFA in a couple of years. This man has been the top agent for many years and has a superstar list of clients who respect him. He has negotiated with GMs across the league. He played Junior Hockey in the Q and was a good player. He has also been involved in building grassroots hockey in California.

This is a man with great credentials and contacts who knows the game. He also knows the collective bargaining agreement because of his role as agent. He has a terrific public image and seems passionate about being involved in growing the game.

If the man is interested in the job, I think he should be the top choice. If it were possible to bring in a tandem of Brisson-Brisebois, I think that would be a dream.

Exciting days ahead as we await the outcome of the search for our next GM.

ummmm..iam sure Brisson would devoid himself of hockey agent business. gillis did the same when he went to Vancouver.
it will never happen anyway as Brisson will end up taking a paycut..he makes serious coin as an agent.

What do you guys think it would take to grab a pick around the 10-15 spot? Would something like a second + Weber/Diaz/Dietz start a conversation with a team looking to pick a Dman? Would ne nice to grab Faksa or Colberg after Galchenyuk/Grigorenko/Forsberg.

But if the Flames trade away their pick you’d have to imagine that fan base will form a mob to remove Feaster. Still can’t believe they haven’t blown that team up. They have between assets that could be flipped for a boatload of prospects and picks.

They are more valuable but not when making a trade. To get somebody to give up a draft pick in that range you have to provide a pick from that range or a collection of picks that meat a threshold necessary for the other team to part with the pick.

You think a 2nd and a 3rd is gonna get that done? No chance in hell.

If you want a 10-15 pick, you’re giving up a first round pick or prospect who was a first round pick.

Teams don’t select players in the first round that they believe are a long shot to make the NHL.

If it requires Beaulieu, Tinordi, or Gallagher, then yeah that will be too much to pay. I know my offer is a lowball, but that’s why I was saying a start.

Dietz has been coming along nicely and like Weber or Diaz, will be ready sooner than anyone picked in the mid first round. Throw in our 2nd, which is likely to be 30-35, and I think that’s a good starting point. But whatever that 3rd piece would be is what would make it worth doing or not.

I think your reasoning is skewed a bit because your forgetting that Florida already had picked 3rd in 2010. The upshot of the trade was that Florida gained one draft pcik in 2010 in return for moving down 5 spots. FLO walked in friday morning with 2 first rd and 2 second rd picks and walked out with 2 first rd and 3 second rd picks. To do the equivalent means you have to target WAsh or Buff as they are the only teams with picks in the 10-15th spots and have multiple first rd picks. Then then you have to convince them that the bird in the bush (2013 1st round) is better than the one in their hand.

Anyone else thinking it would be good to hire someone like Bergevin who is connected out west? Teams are always more likely to trade talented players to another conference, right? In a perfect world GMs should always be happy to take each other’s calls, but I don’t think we live in a perfect world. I suspect Gauthier made all his trades secretly because he knew most of the GMs wouldn’t pick up when they saw Cookie Monster on their caller id.

I hate the NHL standings. It tells me very little about how teams are doing in regulation. I want to know over 60 minutes of true hockey whether the team generally wins loses or ties. An overtime win or shootout win ar not at all the same quality of victory as an overtime win. I wish the standings would include regulation wins.

In a world of wins, losses and ties, without overtime, Montreal would have 22 wins 35 losses and 22 ties for 66 points. Over 70% of Montreal’s games result in at least one point for the opposition.

Teams are awarded a phantom goal for or against for shootout wins and losses. I would prefer that the goals for and against be limited to goals actually scored or allowed. It becomes very difficult to compare teams when the numbers are flawed.

Florida, who may win their weak division, has 30 regulation wins and 25 ties for 85 non gimmick points. Ex phantom shootout goals, they scored 191 goals and allowed 211. Montreal scored 197 goals and allowed 210. As bad as Montreal actually is, their record could easily improve next season by 20 points without doing anything. The NHL regular season is so random that the same quality of offense and defense can lead to a last place finish or a third seed in the playoffs. This does not make hockey less entertaining but it does make the results less meaningful.

I don’t think it matters what percentage of regulation tied games to a shootout. Deciding a game by providing each team with three breakaways is a ridiculous way to determine a team’s merit for the playoffs where there is no such deciding factor in a hockey game.

By large majority the four on four hockey that I’ve seen has been exciting and full of skill and teamwork.

This isn’t basketball, football or soccer regardless of how much Mr. Bettman would like it to be.

1198 games season to date. 290 games went to overtime. 115 were settled in overtime and 175 were shootouts .

24% of games result in a regulation tie.
14.6% of games result in an overtime tie
39.6% of ties are settled in overtime.
60.4% of ties are settled in the shootout.

In 1990, prior to overtime, 13.3% of games resulted in a regulation tie. In 1989 less than 12% of games resulted in a tie.
With overtime, regulation ties are twice as prevalent as without. This is partly due to lower goals per game today than 1990 but also a consequence of teams playing less aggressively when tied in the third period.

The NHL semantics are that each team is awarded a point of a regulation tie and a bonus point is awarded to the overtime or shootout winner. So there is no loser point, only a winner point. But the fans look at it as awarding a point for losing a game in overtime and two points for winning a game in overtime. The NHL has not convinced many people that their system makes sense.

I never saw anything wrong with regular regulation hockey, 60 minutes resulting in a win loss or tie. I would be happy with that system. I would also be happy if all games led to either a winner take all win or loss and points were eliminated in favor of winning percentage like baseball or basketball. But to me, the current points system and standings are confusing and misleading.

I feel like the clock has been effectively stopped with five minutes to go in the third if the game is tied. Teams shut down and play for the overtime point. My stats above show that in the overtime era, regulation ties have doubled. I think that can be partially attributed to conservative play late in tied games. Perhaps a stats expert can run a test of prevalence of tie breaking goals scored in the last five minutes of games today compared to the prior era.

This is the second most significant reason that the loser point should not be awarded. It takes away from the product on the ice. The most important being that teams are rewarded with a point for every game that goes to overtime.

I would be satisfied with the current system deciding games but with no point for being tied at the conclusion of regulation.

Sunny day here in Habcentral, and I’m goin’ to the game tonight!
Only pity is that I have no goddamn voice…bleh.
Taking an Irish buddy along with me. He’s been here nearly a year and is a total Habs fanatic now. Bad year to start supporting La Flannelle, but I guess it can only get better…

LOL I’d love to see Plekanec just finally snap after all the losing, the crappy assignments, the AHL wingers, and drag Malone to the woodshed & take out a whole year + of frustration on him in an epic surprise beatdown!

Money isn’t everything and reaching out to Pat Brisson is one thing. But looking at his list of clients, it would take nothing short of a miracle for him to leave his current job to join the Canadiens as GM. They include Crosby, Briere, Duchene, Fowler, Heatley, Kane, Kopitar, Malkin, the Sedins, Tavares, Toews, Giroux and he also has Nathan Mackinnon.

I figure those guys alone are netting him around $6.5 million annually. And I left a lot of names out.

I think the only thing that would drive Brisson is if his ego wants the challenge, and perhaps he has a deep rooted passion for the Habs.

I don’t make the ego comment in a negative light, but eventually when a person has had the success he has, it becomes more about ego than money. (So I am told, for now money is still important to me hehe).

Other factors to note are that in the agency world Brisson would be able to sell his book of business to a colleague with the same firm for half of the commission over the life of the contracts. So he could probably walk from his agency with around $20 million in balloon payment.

The other is the question of what the Habs are willing to pay the right candidate? I’m guessing no more than $3 million but that is an uneducated guess.

And I’m ALL for bilingual. As long as they don’t (cough-PG-cough) suck. If bookies took bets on how PG was going to turn out as a Habs GM, the HIO commentariate could’ve put the mafia out of business. So obviously not a guy with the right insight and talents to be a big dog in the big leagues.

Well, as no one has posted this (to my knowledge) and it’s VERY slow newsday… what if we WERE in the playoffs and PRICE HAS A FREAKING CONCUSSION and we have NO SERIOUS BACKUP GOALIE… there’s fat for the fire.

Thanks. I’m here all week.

Also, Down Goes Brown has the GM application form, it’s hilarious. (Previously posted by another HIOer , but worth revisiting)

Bobrovsky? Enroth has one win in how many months? Theodore and Clemmensen are shaky at best. The Capitals goaltending has been abysmal all season long.

Hedberg I’ll give you. And I would be more comfortable with the Canucks situation even with Luongo’s bi-polar tendencies.

I realize Budaj doesn’t inspire a lot of confidence. But putting myself in the shoes of the teams you mentioned. There isn’t a single organization other than the Canucks, Bruins and Blues where I would be comfortable with the backup, and in the Canucks case, I’d be more comfortable with the backup than the starter.

Good points. As a digression, Foligno’s hit on Gunnarson last night was fierce, and if it’s OK to go way back, Larry Robinson demolished Gary Dornhoefer, and Wendel Clark did the same to Mark Howe (after which he had a Rockem Sockem Robot fight with Rich Tocchet).

Given NBC’s interest in the NHL with their new tv contract and the fact that their new sports station relies on NHL to fill alot of time, will executives at NBC be at all concerned with Milbury’s blathering comments? Pittsburgh and Crosby are the darlings of NBC’s TV coverage afterall.

The Leafs have not allowed us to speak to Loiselle because they are re-thinking their front office. They will get rid of Burke at the end of the season and Loiselle would be among the possible replacements.

Great video. Scrivens lost his stick and held onto Leopold’s. Leafs win the draw but Komie couldn’t get possession and couldn’t slow Foligno but had me convinced they do put pylons on the ice during play.

I have always wondered if there is a bit of a guilt by association with Moore as it relates to his brother suing an NHL team/Bertuzzi etc…

I have no insight on it, but seems no team will give him more than a 1 year contract and are happy to move him. Odd to say the least. Of course one of the first moves Burke did was get rid of Moore as I recall.

In 77 games with Tampa and San Jose, Moore has 4 goals and 24 points while posting a -18 rating in an average 15:30 of ice time.

That kind of production is okay if you are a 20-24 year old developing forward.

But Dominic Moore is a 31 year old. He had a career high 18 goals last season with Tampa, but hadn’t topped 13 goals in his 5 seasons before that.

Given the amount that he has been traded (5 mid-season trades) and the fact that no team keeps him around for more than one season, I suspect he might very well be the type of guy that DOES rock the boat in the dressing room.

I really hope Gorges (among other Habs) gets an invitation to play at the World Championships in Finland/Sweden next month. He really deserves to and it would be a mistake to overlook him only because he is useless on the PP.

Ya he’s been playing much better. I just chuckle at that stat because people tried to claim that he was scoring less goals last year and this season because he was passing a lot more and setting up more plays.

I’m firmly in the Pat Brisson for GM camp – solely for what he could bring to the team in players. We need Cid the Kid. Could use Malkin as well…of course, Brisson being GM doesn’t guarantee this happening, but improves the odds.
As for Leaf cast-offs – just say NO.

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☞ Wow, that’s a nice lookin’ pair of Crocs!” Said no one ever.☜

I believe he has been a scratch at least once under Carlyle. Burke assigned those letters, and gave an A to Komisarek to try and justify his existence on team. Burke knows he effed up signing Komi and giving him a no trade and no movement clause. So he has been trying to sell all year how good Komi is in the room. Remind us of a similar situtation here in Montreal about an overpaid veteran being good in the room?

Though not a good player Komi was always regatrded as a good leader even in Montreal.
You recall he was behaind the bench for the Habs when he was injured and the buzz at the time was that he was future captain material.

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“It’s just an opinion – I could be wrong”

He was in decline here well before Luchicken punked him out. He was never ever suggested as captain material by anyone anywhere ever, what a joke. A soft underachiever who tailed off very early in a mediocre career.

They booted Bernie out (the manager of ‘Clyde’s’) because they wanted too much money for the place, then they decided to go back in time to the Bad Old Days when the only bands that played there were crappy cover bands, and the main clientele was the Hell’s Angels.

Next thing, the owners are denied a liquor license.

Then, they book a band playing a tribute to a murdered gang-member, get told off by the police, and then ban hip-hop and try to blame it on everyone else so that they look innocent, and so that they can pretend that it’s someone else’s decision.

I thought KRS-One’s “Stop The Violence in Hip Hop” campaign had been successful. Just the other day I was thinking how that was a non-issue now, that rap was all about the Cee Lo Greens and the Nellys, just commercial music now.

I miss the good old days of Ice Cube and Public Enemy and Tupac and Westside Connection. That was good rap. Says this white boy poseur.